Literati
by Aki and Tenshi
Summary: Literati - 1 a learned or literary man, 2 a Jess/Rory ship, or 3 a post-series fanfic in which Rory and Jess hash and rehash some old issues via mail while contemplating pieces of poetry and literature. Rated for possible language. by PLETE
1. Rory's Letter Sonnet 116

Aki- I've been away from the Gilmore Girls genre for a while. This is an idea I've had for about two years, which is basically themed chapters based off of pieces of poetry and literature, which seems to fit with Rory and Jess. It is based about one year post-series, which is, like now. Um, hope you like. It will probably all be written via mail

...

Jess,

I found myself staring at your name at the top of this page for ten minutes, not knowing what to write or why I decided to write you in the first place. This is not the first time that has happened. I never told you, but remember that summer when I was in D.C., after I kissed you at Sookie's wedding. I didn't contact you all summer. Remember? I tried to write you so many times, but every time I had a moment to sit down with my thoughts, I stared at a piece of loose leaf without a thought of what I should write down except your name at the top. Maybe it was I could never find the right words because I never knew what I felt, whether I was going to say to forget the kiss or that I was going to dump Dean as soon as I got back to Stars Hollow. I didn't know what I should have said until I saw you sucking face with Shane "Come Back" and my heart broke. It's not your fault, even though I blamed you then, thinking you could read my mind or something, to know what I wanted even though _I_ didn't know what I wanted.

I'm having the same problem know. I don't know what I want from writing this letter to you. Consequently, I don't know what words to right to convey what I want to tell you. This is ridiculous and I'm rambling. I'm on a bus right now. In case you didn't know, I'm a journalist for an on-line magazine, covering Obama's campaign trail. I've been all over the U.S. It's not quite Christiana Amanpour, but it's a start. We have a lot of time on some of these extremely humid bus trips between editing articles and such. I was, well, reading, go figure, and something I read made me think of you in a really round-about way.

It's Shakespeare. Sonnet 116 or a part of it:

_Love is not love_

_Which alters when it alteration finds,_

_Or bends with the remover to remove:_

_O no! it is an ever-fixed mark_

_That looks on tempests and is never shaken;_

This poem, well, it actually made me think of Logan first. God, you probably hate me for saying that, but then it made me think of you. You didn't understand how I could love Logan even after what he had done to me. Cheated on me. You didn't say it in so many words, but I could tell it from your face. Love is not really love unless you never give up on it. I looked on the tempests, the storms, I faced one of the worst betrayals someone you love could do to you, and I still loved him past any regret or anger or even resentment that built up in me for it.

This is a _great_ explanation. A great rationalization. It's funny though, Logan and I, we broke up. We're done. Not because of anything bad he did either. He didn't cheat on me again, he never came close. He proposed. He wanted to marry me. I think I could have said 'yes.' I think I would have said 'yes' if things we're different. Not him, he was fine, but just things. The timing. Timing's everything, right?

So I said 'no.' I was not ready too move to California and settle down and give up traveling the world. I tried to tell him. I suggested long-distance again. We did it when he was in London for his job. But Logan said he didn't want to do long-distance again. But love is an ever-fixed mark. It shouldn't move, right? If I loved him enough to stay with him after him sleeping a whole bridal party, even though we may or may not have been on a break, and stayed with him when he was in London for his job, then why couldn't he love me enough to stay with me while I put my ass on a bus and traveled all over the U.S. It wasn't forever, either, just a while. And there were even times we were in one area long enough that he could visit me or me him. Was his love a love that altered and was bent or was removed because of the circumstances? Then I thought maybe it was me that didn't love him enough to marry him. Or maybe that's what he saw. But even if he did see that, if he really loved me that shouldn't have altered anything!!

I'm so confused. I guess this is really should be something I'm writing to Mom or Lane or even Logan himself. For some reason, for some reason I don't quite know, I'm writing to you. I don't know if I'm going to send this yet, still, so if you get it, well, then I did send it.

Rory


	2. Jess's Response Sonnet 116

Rory,

Yes, I remember that summer. I do believe I was made out with Shane to make you jealous. I know that's a jerky thing to do, but, hey, I was an eighteen year old idiot and, well, it worked. I did for a different reason as well. I was afraid, after you didn't contact me all summer, even by smoke signal, that you didn't want me. That you would say it was a mistake and to forget it even. After we kissed you ran off and yelled at me to promise not tell anyone. I didn't.

Oh, yes, you were rambling. I didn't know people could do that in a letter. Isn't that the one they ball up and throw into a wire waste basket full of other messed up letters, right?

Now, to your predicament with the blonde dickhead. I never did understand your attachment to him or why you so stubbornly clung onto his arm even though he did nothing for you. In fact, he had a negative impact on you, if you allow me to put my opinion on it.

You're right, Shakespeare's right. Love is not something that changes. It's there, through the bad and the good. The bold and the beautiful, and the old and the ugly.

If that jerk was not willing to give you the time you needed, wasn't willing to love you and stay with you while you were away, like you did for him, he doesn't deserve you. Don't doubt you're love for him…I don't. You stuck with him through all kinds of shit, he should have stuck with you through whatever you needed to do.

You see:

_Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks_

_Within his bending sickle's compass come:_

_Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,_

_But bears it out even to the edge of doom._

There is more of Mr. Shakespeare's sonnet for you. I think I've heard of him before. People always say he knew his stuff. No one likes to be rejected. How long has it been since the proposal, almost over a year now, right? I knew you were on Obama's trail from Luke. He was actually complaining how much Lorelai was annoying him since you were gone with her over dramatics. I figure the proposal was before that. I'm surprised the jackass hasn't tried to contact you since then. After we broke up I showed up a year later and professed my love for you. Sorry to open old wounds, for both of us. I just can't believe he found love that easy to let go of. I never did.

_ If this be error and upon me proved,_

_ I never writ, nor no man ever loved_.

That's that couplet at the end of Sonnet 116. I guess Willy is trying to say, if his description of love isn't correct, then he never wrote anything and no man in the history of the world ever loved. I know from personal experience that neither of those are truth. Willy must be right about love.

I don't what that means about Logan then.

Perhaps you're baffled that I wrote back, or that I was able to track you down at a hotel along your traveling campaign trail. I have only one answer for this: Yahoo. It's a very useful search engine. Although, I think I'm going to be converting to Google. Because Google is just as fun to say as Yahoo. And Google makes more sense as a search engine name, because it is a really big number and that is how many results you will find when you search. And Google has been turned into different word forms such as googled or googling. I guess, just as you, I'm not sure if I am going to send this, even though I found out were you are going to be staying for the next two weeks. If you get it, then I did.

-Jess

……

**Aki-** I got a good response on the last chapter and I already had this one written an I thought, what the heck, give the people what they want. Oh yeah, the sonnet which has been used in these last two chapter is William Shakespeare's sonnet 116 aka "Let not to the marriage of true minds."


	3. Rory's Response The Broken Oar

Jess,

I was surprised you reply. Then again, I was surprised I wrote a letter to you in the first place and am even surprised I'm writing this one now. I really should be proofing my latest article instead.

Your time line with the Logan deal was spot on. Good assuming. It's been almost a year, but it isn't easy to get over someone you spent such a long time with. Sometimes I think how life might have been if I said 'yes.' I would be in California now. Planning a wedding, or maybe just married. It's a crazy thought. I still feel like a little kid, the idea of getting married seems so grown up.

Your letter was…interesting. It was weird to see you analyzing poetry. That was new. Your perspective on Logan was biased, but supportive. But there was something else, like you were saying something without flat out saying it. Hinting really. Or maybe it was subconscious. Or maybe I was digging way much into nothing. However, I was reading some more sonnets, but not good ole Billy's this time, but Longfellow. It was called the "The Broken Oar" and basically he is walking along the beach in Iceland, of all places, struggling to find the ending words for something he's written. I know I've had that problem for different articles I've written. Did you with your book?

Anyway, then suddenly:

_Then by the billows at his feet was tossed_

_A broken oar; and carved thereon he read,_

_'Oft was I weary, when I toiled at thee';_

_And like a man, who findeth what was lost,_

_He wrote the words, then lifted up his head,_

_And flung his useless pen into the sea. _

I have toiled at writing articles, but currently, I have toiled, trying to understand your subtlety about certain issues in your previous letter. And I am weary trying to find out whether or not anything subtle was written into the letter at all. Trying to figure you out has always been a challenge. You're a hard man to pin down, Jess Mariano.

You must think I'm crazy, talking about what you may or may not have been insinuating in your last letter. Especially if you hadn't been insinuating at all! That why I have failed to mention what it is incase I am a great fool making things up.

But if you are insinuating things and we are thinking of the same thing, then I don't know what to think. I guess I should have known, but still, it's weird. Why would you still…me? Really? After what I did. After all I've did. The rejections, the return, the kiss…I don't deserve to have you to have writing letters to me, let alone you still feel that way for me.

Except...I don't now, I think I don't agree with I said in my first letter on Logan and I and love. On how I didn't love him enough or he didn't love me enough. I don't think "enough" is the right word to put after love. I mean, when you love someone, whether it like unconditional love from a parent, or brotherly love between best friends, or romantic love, you love someone completely, wholly. Nothing changes that love. However, the love does not always dictate your actions. I think that sometimes other things other than lose or lack of love can destroy a relationship, like lose of trust or lose of immediate gratification. Just because you care for someone and they care for you, doesn't mean it's all going to work out.

Aw, man. I just stopped and reread what I wrote and most of it sounds so idiotic. I don't know what to do. I'm probably going to throw this away. I'm don't think I'm going to send this, but if you get it I did.

-Rory

P.S.- It would a whole lot easier for you not having to track me down and whole lot faster if we emailed rather than snail-mail, but…I like writing letters. It's a sort of catharsis in actually using a pen and paper. And not have a backspace button so handy.

…

**Aki**- I don't like this chapter as much as the other two, but I do like what I am setting up for the next chapter.


	4. Jess's Response Astrophil and Stella

**Aki- **The sonnet in this chapter is by Sir Philip Sidney. I do not own the poem or anything affiliated with Gilmore Girls. This is actually the poem I read over a year ago that inspired the idea for this story.

…

Rory,

It wasn't the ending line or lines that caused me trouble when I wrote _The Subsect_. No, it was the complete opposite that caused me trouble, the beginning. Not just the words, but starting out at all. I can't quite explain my thought process when I decided to start writing. I never dreamed of getting published, I was just trying to do…something. I wanted to create something, something that wouldn't be there if it weren't for me. And I wanted to prove something, that I could do something worth praise.

I meant what I said that night. I couldn't have done it without you. You believed in me like no one else ever did before. I think Luke believed in me, but not the same way. He saw that I could go somewhere better than where I was heading, but I don't think he always thought I would make it. But you, even after I ran away, I always thought that you thought that I would be better. For some reason, having someone believe in you for the first time like that makes you really believe in yourself. I may have never gone to college and not finished high school, but that doesn't mean I have to fail at life.

To be honest, I may have had some ulterior motives to writing the novel as well. I wanted to show it to you. I wanted to prove myself. I don't think it went as I planned, not when I saw who you had become and not when I met the 'blonde dick at Yale.' You loved my novel, even though I've grown to want to revise it, change, throw all the copies into a furnace…but you still didn't get. You still don't.

I don't know how to explain it. For being a novelist I 'm not always good at putting what I want to say into words. At explaining what I want to say out loud to the people I care about. I found this poem to help. I know, me finding poems, seriously.

_Loving in truth, and fain in verse my love to show,  
That She, dear She, might take some pleasure of my pain,  
Pleasure might cause her read, reading might make her know,  
Knowledge might pity win, and pity grace obtain -  
I sought fit words to paint the blackest face of woe,  
Studying inventions fine, her wits to entertain,  
Oft turning others' leaves, to see if thence would flow  
Some fresh and fruitful showers upon my sunburnt brain.  
But words came halting forth, wanting Invention's stay;  
Invention, Nature's child, fled step-dame Study's blows;  
And others' feet still seemed but strangers in my way.  
Thus, great with child to speak, and helpless in my throes,  
Biting my truant pen, beating myself for spite -  
"Fool!" said my Muse to me "look in thy heart, and write!"_

It's the first sonnet in a big collection of them called "Astrophil and Stella". Those are names that mean, "Star-lover and Star". See, it's about this dude who is a poet and he likes this girl and he wants to impress her with his writing. He wants to win hr grace and favor but putting how much he tortuously loves her in words that she might pity him and that pity will turn into something else. All the while he's trying to come up with these profound words to write and his muse tells him, "Stop being an annoying idiot, just write what's in your heart, fool!" Or something like that. I don't know, you read the poem.

Do you understand now what you were insinuating what I might have been insinuating?

Do you understand why I wrote in the first place?

I'm not sure I'm going to send this letter. But if you get it, then I guess I did.

Love,

Jess


	5. Rory's Response She Was Too Kind

Dear Jess,

Yeah, I get it. Both things. I guess I've known, but I didn't want to admit it. You love me. You love me still. Despite everything. I don't know how to respond. I'm flustered and…a little flattered. What girl wouldn't be to have the attention of a guy like you. I just feel like an idiot. I show have known. I mean, you showed up a year after we broke up and told me you loved me. Three months after you tried to convince me to run away with you. Over a year passed, then you popped up again and showed me your book and yelled at me to fix my life. Then you sent me an invitation to your open house and I came and I kissed you and you kissed me back and then I admitted my true reason for being there.

I wish, I wish so much that after your last letter, that was so open and loving and touching, a love letter from a daydream, really, that I could tell you I loved you back. I care for you. I care for you a lot. I want you to do well. I always have, no matter how mad I ever got at you, I wanted you to succeed.

I like you too. I may have loved you once. I said that over the phone if that was you on the other line. I may have loved you. I don't know now. I think I was just on the edge of love then. Almost attained, just entered the mind that that could have been what I was feeling. I wish I could tell you I love and not just for you. Not for your comfort or ease of mind. I wish I actually did love you. I like you. I really do.

_I liked, but like and love are far removed;_

_Hard though I tried to love I tried in vain._

Samuel Butler. "She was too kind, wooed to persistently." I don't blame you. For anything anymore. There was a time I did. I don't. I know what it is like to be lost, now. You weren't perfect when we were teens, but I have made my fair share of mistakes back then. I just wish things had gone differently, back then. I wish you hadn't left right at that time when I might have been falling in love with you because then I would know how I feel.

I don't know what else to say. If you've made it this far without tearing this piece of paper up or balling it up and tossing it in the nearest garbage disposal, I'm so going to change the subject. It's so weird to see you talking about poetry, when you are a self-professed hater of it. I mean, it as one thing when you were analyzing the same poem that I wrote first, but you finding a poem to talk about you and me and us. That was, well, it was so,…I was going to write strange or out of character, but now the only word that comes to mind is sweet. It was so sweet. Sweet and Jess Mariano were not words I used to put together in my mind. Jess and reading. Jess and brooding teen. Jess and rock. Jess and James Dean. Jess and …incredibly hot. But not Jess and sweet. You've changed. I won't say whether it is in a good way or a bad way, but just changed.

I don't want to send this letter. I really don't. I don't to hurt you with this response. I don't know if I'm going to send it. I don't know. But I think it would be worse for you to get no response at all. Silence is an even worse rejection. I know. When you said nothing back on the phone, if that really was you, it cut me through. I don't know if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I did.

-Rory

…

**Aki-** Not exactly happy, but I can't have them all lovey-dovey just after chapter 5. That's no good. Life isn't like a romantic movie. People can't just say "I love you" and expect it to be alright. Poem is a sonnet by Samuel Butler. I know I'm using a lot of sonnets right now, but I change in a few chapters.


	6. Jess's Response She Was Too Kind

Rory,

Don't worry about it. Honestly, I didn't expect you to come crawling back to me like in some chick-flick because of few pretty words. Life doesn't work like that. Not for me, it doesn't. I'm not mad at you or anything. Disappointed, maybe, from holding on to a hope of a hope, but angry, naw, not at you.

I almost felt a little guilty writing my last letter. I know that sounds weird, but I don't want to push my one-sided feelings on you. That's never happened to me before, but I'm sure it is uncomfortable. I mean, I knew…I know, you don't feel the same way about me that I feel about you. Over the last couple years you've made it pretty obvious, no offense.

You cared abut me once. Cared about me more then just a friend. If I blew it by being an idiot, it's not my right to blame you for not loving me back now. It was fault. In the beginning. All the wrongs you have done me since were because of my actions first. I wouldn't have admitted that a few years ago. I was too good at being bitter. But there is something about being a novelist that forces me to look at cause and effect and consequences of a character's actions.

It seems that Butler has some lines that work for me as well:

_Therefore I grieve, not that I was not loved,_

_But that, being loved, I could not love again. _

That was me on the phone. I kept calling you. I wanted to say _something_ but I could never come up with the words after you picked up. You must have been so confused to what I was doing. Well, I was confused to what I was doing as well. What is supposed to be an apology, an explanation, a goodbye? I don't know. I never figured that out. And then that one time you spoke. You said you were moving on. You said you wanted me to do well. You said you may have loved me, but you were going to let it go. I couldn't let it go. That was the first time a girl had ever said that to me before. You were my first real relationship. I dated other people. I ritually made-out with other girls, but I never connected to anyone like I did to you. I wasn't just physical. It was real.

You may have loved me once. If I hadn't screwed that shit up then you may have actually loved me at some time. But I had it, maybe just for a little while. So I will not be aggravated that I was never loved, because I was. But I'm stuck. I'm stuck in this love for you. I never meant to tell you. I never meant to. But then you wrote me and I wrote back and it's lead to this place somehow. I can't believe I'm being a hopeless sap, but it's how I feel. It's how I am now. Sometimes it's really hard to move on.

About the whole poetry thing. Yeah, I did hate poetry. I always thought, just come out and say it already. Stop hiding your meaning behind metaphors and flowery words and rhyme and meter. But then I realized I was a hypocrite, because I am no good at that. Especially when I was younger at coming out and just saying what I thought or what I felt. Particularly what I felt. I'm horrible at it. Until recently, and its still damn hard for me. It's a little easier in these letters. It's a little easier not face to-face, or even over the phone. I guess the reason is that you always have the chance not to send it. So many times, just in my experience, have I said something I wanted to take back, but couldn't. But in letters, you can write whatever you want, but not have to send it. You always have a choice to second think what you want to say. No impulsive words out of anger or passion or bitterness. On that note, I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I did.

Love,

Jess

…

**Aki-** Readers, please note that I am really chopping up these two sonnets that I'm using excerpts from in this chapter, the last chapter, and the next chapter, and liberally interrupting them to my own needs. If you read the poem, although the ideas are sorta in context, the poem overall is about something slightly different. I think this chapter is the interpretation most from the scheme of the actual poem.


	7. Rory's Response She Was Too Kind 2

Dear Jess,

I still feel bad. I do. I can't help it. It's funny, now that I think about it that was the third time a guy's told me they loved me, and I wasn't able to say it back. The second time with you. The first time was with Dean, if you were curious. It was way before you popped up in Stars Hollow. We broke up over it to. I ended up telling him I loved him a month or two later.

With Logan, I told him I loved him before he said he loved me. In fact, now that I think over his response, he didn't really tell me he loved me back. He did other times. He told me he loved me other times after that, but not then. He said something like, "I've told a lot of girls I loved them, but didn't mean it. I don't want you to be one of them. Damn, that sounded a lot more romantic in my head." I wanted to say it first that time. I really did. I wanted to have the control, not to be caught off guard again.

I still wish I could tell you I loved you. But that would be wrong. That would be so wrong, when I know it's not true. And it hurts me and I know it hurts you. I don't want you to be stuck. I want you to be happy, even when it's not with me.

_I could not. Hence I grieve my whole life long_

_The wrong I did, in that I did no wrong. _

I don't love you. I love you as a friend. I love you as a person. But I don't _love you _love you. Although I'll admit that over the several weeks of sending these letters, I've never felt closer to you before. Even when we dated for months. You were never this open before. But it would never work, not with me on a bus and you in Philly. Maybe that was Logan's problem to. It wouldn't work with me in a bus and him in California.

For as much as I say I feel this way or feel that way, sometimes I think I don't base my love on feelings at all, or at least not to a large extent. I want to keep from getting hurt, but that hinders me from taking chances. I get so into the details of what may or may not happen. I analysis and reanalysis. I couldn't say "I love you too" to Dean way back then because I was afraid of what it might mean. My parents said the loved each other but everything had fallen apart for them. Then with you, even though I really liked you, I continued in my relationship with Dean, I led him on, because it was safe. It was secure. I was used to it and I was not ready to risk loosing it. I did that and I hurt all three of us.

Sometimes my feelings of anger or lust or whatever cause me to react in snapshot decisions. Like when I slept with Dean when he was married. Well, crap, you didn't know that, did you? Or when I ran away from you at the Firelight Festival instead of acting mature. Or when I said "no" just to make you hurt. I mean, realistically, I don't think I would have ran away with you, but I might not have been so brusque. I might have talked it out with you. Maybe I even would have been crazy enough to run away just for a few days. I don't know. But sometimes I let logic control my love life more than my emotions. More than love or affection or whether or not I really care for someone.

I guess that was what Butler meant when he wrote:

_That though I loved her in a certain sort_

_Yet did I love too wisely but not well_

All my logic and reasoning has leapt me from loving to the fullest, from opening myself up completely, from taking chances in the name of love. Don't get me wrong, I think reasoning comes into part of it. Love just isn't always enough. But still, it should still count for a lot. I reason too much. You can't make a pro/con list about someone you love. Gosh, I must sound like an idiot. I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I did.

-Rory

…

**Aki-** A question, has anyone noticed the recurring line at the end of all the letters?


	8. Jess's Response Othello

Rory,

That line, that one line is Butler's poem that you used in your last letter. I knew I had heard it before somewhere. I knew I had, but not from reading the sonnet, because I'm not the kind of guy that goes and picks up books of sonnets and has a gay ole time. After having it both me for two days, I finally figured it out. _Othello._ That line about, "I loved too wisely, but not well," that is from the tragedy of _Othello._ I know, suddenly were back to Shakespeare again. I'll tell you flat out, I have nothing against Shakespeare, he has some pretty good plays, although I hadn't touched his sonnets before, well, before you sent you first letter.

Back to the line. It is actually something that Othello, the main character of _Othello_, who'd a thought, says…after killing his wife, and before killing himself when he realizes he had been deceived into thinking she was unfaithful by this guy that wanted revenge on him (It's a Shakespearean tragedy, a lot of people die).

He says:

_I pray you, in your letters,_

_When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,_

_Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,_

_Nor set down aught in malice; then must you speak_

_Of one that loved not wisely but too well._

He's asking of those that witnessed the horrible deeds that were occurring, many by his own hands, to record him as he is, but not to exaggerate or write in hate. He wants them to remember that he did not love wisely, but too well. You see, it's the same line, but switched. Butler was twisting Bill's words for effect.

See, I think I fit those original words like you fit Butler's version. I was an idiot. (hell, maybe I still am). I was a fool because I loved. I love you, even before I admitted aloud to you a year after I ran away. I loved, but I messed it up with being jealous of Dean, and using Shane to make you jealous, and being a jerk to your mother and grandmother because I didn't have the will to even attempt to be courteous. I messed it up with running away without even a word of goodbye or explanation. I made a hell of a lot of mistakes and I hurt you a lot.

That doesn't mean I didn't love you or I loved you any less. It was me being a fool with love. See, perhaps I loved "too well". I loved so much that I came back a year later to tell you, even after I had broken your heart because I thought you should know. I loved so much that I asked you to run away with me.

But I did not love wisely. I already listed many of my transgressions above. Now, I'm not like you. I never made considerations or think about consequences. I didn't think about right or wrong or what was safe or not. Didn't think about if I would hurt you just as long as I had you. It was selfish. I did not love you wisely, but too well.

I also like that quote from Shakespeare, because, well, he's talking about letters. I find it ironic, that he is talking about letters, because we are sending letters. I don't know. I guess it really doesn't reply. Nevermind.

I know may years have passed since the hurts I have done you occurred. I want to apologize for them, because I don't think I ever did before. Many things will still happen in your life, many things worse than me and better than me and all the things I have done in your life, both good and bad. I hope that one day you will be able to speak of me not as a crazy ex-boyfriend who broke your heart, but…well, as one who loved.

God, that was sappy. My seventeen year old self would have punched me out for writing that, Jeez! I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I did.

Love,

Jess


	9. Rory's Response The Great Gatsby

Dear Jess,

Please. Please, stop it. Stop blaming yourself for everything that went wrong between us. I can't stand it. I really, really can't. Every time I admit to my wrongdoings, you response with saying how _you_ messed us first and how _you_ caused me to do bad things to you. That is crap. Yes, you did hurt me. Yes, you did do some bad things. However, you are not responsible for my bad actions against you. It is not payback or karma or divine judgment or freaking cause and effect.

I'm guilty, okay? I'm guilty for my actions. Just because you may have done something wrong does not give me the right or power to do something wrong back to you. Yelling at you when you came back after a year absence, my anger was reasonable. Telling you 'no' when you asked me to run away is completely understandable, even though I hadn't done with the best tact. Showing up at your open house, flirting with you, kissing you, all with an ulterior motive and while I was in a relationship with someone else, inexcusable. I'm not saying that I _want_ you to hate me or be mad, but it would be understandable. If you've gotten over it or forgiven me, that is okay. But please, don't make it sound like I have done nothing wrong in this weird little relationship between the two of us. Because I have. And please, even more, do not place my poor actions on your conscious, because you "started it".

Allow me to quote Fitzgerald for a moment, "_It takes two to make an accident_."

Even our relationship, when we were actually a couple, when it fell apart, it wasn't your fault. Not totally. I'm not going to say you're blameless, because you are not. But neither am I. You might have been the one who ran away to wherever the hell you went off to, but I was the one who ran away the summer before, right after our first kiss. You might have been the one whose temper flared easily, but I didn't exactly make it any easy on you. I didn't trust you. I never quite could. I should have. I had no reason to doubt you. I guess I left the biases of the town and the horrible things people said about you sway me.

I've always has this weird safety of the town being on my side. With Dean, with you. I never got blame pushed on me. I never had to suffer like you did from them. And it's not fair. When my life was all screwed up, you know, when I had dropped out of Yale and stole a boat and wasn't talking to my mom and was living with my grandparents, not even then did I get that much blame pushed me. Only from Mom, and she had every right to do it, because she was trying to get me realizing that what I was doing was not okay. And you yelled at me too. I don't think you realize, but you saved me. Jess Mariano was yelling at me to fix my life, the irony. What the people in Stars Hollow would have thought if that had seen that a few years ago. You fixed me.

The problem is, the problem still is, that I never got punished for what I did to you, in Philly. I did a horrible thing. I never told anyone that I kissed you there, not my mom, not Lane or Paris, not even Logan. With that one action, I betrayed both you and Logan in a single swoop. But I never got punished for it. Logan never knew. You didn't even seem to want to. You should have. You should yelled at me for what I did, but instead you told me I could tell Logan that we did something if I wanted and I tried to apologize and you said, "It is what it is. You. Me." What the hell does that mean anyway. What is what it is? Where are you and me? I don't understand, Jess. I really don't.

I guess I'm tired of being perfect. No, that's not it. I'm tired of being thought of as perfect, because I know I'm not. I feel guilty because people overlook my faults too much. It's like living a lie and I can't do anything about it.

I'm sorry, this was a letter I started out writing trying to tell you not to blame yourself and it ended up with me complaining. Jess, you don't have to apologize. I've forgiven you a long time ago. I sound so whiny in this letter. I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I guess I did.

-Rory

….

**Aki- **I've had this written for a day or two, but I hadn't felt like proofing it or uploading it…a mystery…


	10. Jess's Response The Great Gatsby

**Aki- **Next chapter. More of _The Great Gatsby, _which is gonna stick around for a while cuz I love this book and it has som really great quotes that apply really easily to Rory and Jess. Kudos to my new beta, kaypgirl, for fixing stuff in this chapter.

…

Rory,

I know you're not perfect. I couldn't fall in love with someone who was perfect. But when you love someone, sometimes you are all too willing to overlook their faults, or at least forgive them, because of all their attributes that you like. I mean, you forgave Logan for cheating on you, that's pretty big. You said you loved him despite all the bad he's done. This is the same thing.

Now what was with you throwing a _Great Gatsby_ quote out there without referencing properly? You only told me Fitzgerald. But I've been recently getting up to date with Fitzy, so I as able to place it. The funny part is, that line is talking about a car accident. It takes two to make a car accident, so that way Jordan does feel bad about being a horrible driver. She says the other drivers will get out of her way. But Fitz probably wanted it to have a double meaning. It's funny though. When I crashed your car, it was only my fault, and a furry creature of some sort.

But I'll admit that here was a time that I idolized you. Somewhere between "run away with me" and "this is the book I wrote". And then I saw you again and you weren't the person I was expecting. But it wasn't your fault. Sure, you had messed up, but that is bound to happen sometimes. Everyone needs to fall down once in a while, it makes them stronger when they are able to get back up. It was just a mind-blowing experience to see you not in school. You love school, like, actually _love_ school, not just a single subject or a hunky teacher, but love school. You weren't up to my expectations when I came back. But I don't think that even if you were still in school and everything was working out that you would have been up to my expectations. I had built you up too much in my mind.

I think I, too, need to quote Fitzgerald, "_There must have been moment even that afternoon when Daisy tumbled short of his dreams – not through her own fault but because of the colossal vitality of his illusion. It had gone beyond her, beyond everything. He had thrown himself into it with a creative passion…_"

You see, Jay Gatsby spent years of his life trying to become a person Daisy could love. Not that he himself wasn't a person she could not love. She had loved him at one time, but they could have never worked out. She was high society and he was a poor World War I veteran. Yeah, he was a war hero, but that wasn't good enough. By the time he got back from war she had moved away and was engaged to someone in her social circle. He knew he had to be better. He gained wealth, he gained status, he moved across the bay from Daisy and threw parties every week in hopes she would walk in. But it still wouldn't have worked out if she came because she was old money and he was new money. She was married and had a child. Yet they ended up in an affair because Gatsby was desperate and in love and Daisy was bitter from her husband's infidelity and in love.

See, he worked to be a person that was worthy of her love. He threw himself into a creative passion. He did it all for her, to be good enough, for both her expectations and the world's expectations. He worked so hard and had built up the girl in his mind so much that she had to be a disappointment when he met her again, years later. She had become less of a person and more of a god. He couldn't help himself. But that didn't mean he stopped loving her, he just had to readjust his expectations. But it wasn't her fault that she was not as grand and magnificent and beautiful as he remembered her.

As for what we are, what _it _is…well, don't you get it, that's exactly what we are. We have too much history and too much potential. We're too alike and too different. And every time I see you or talk to you or even just write these letters to you, it's elation and it's torture. I don't know how to explain it. There's this elusive chance that we could have made it, if things had been different. The circumstances…us…I don't know. I really don't know.

This letter sounds so moronic, sorry about that. I don't know if I'm going to send this but if you get it, then I guess I did.

Love,

Jess


	11. Rory's Response The Great Gatsby 2

* * *

**Aki- **Sorry for the delay. Thanks again to my beta for smoothing out some stuff. I apologize, this chapter is a bit awkward, but the next one is better.

* * *

Jess,

Gatsby is a pretty interesting guy. Nick, the narrator, really saw him for what he was. Even though Gatsby was the perfect representation of all the vanity and wastefulness and deceit that Nick grew to hate, Gatsby was the only person that Nick didn't hate. Because Gatsby was motivated by something different than the rest of them, something better, deeper, more honest, even in its corruption.

Unfortunately, Gatsby takes on a task he couldn't complete. He was racing after something he couldn't catch. He was trying to do the near impossible. "_He had committed himself to the following of the grail._" I don't think this means Daisy. I think he could have won Daisy. In fact, he always had her heart despite her being married to someone else. No, he was fighting to get something more than just Daisy. He was trying to get Daisy and their original love from when they were young and the conditions were completely different. He was trying to regain the past, which is impossible.

Are you chasing after the grail too, Jess? Some of the things you write make me think you still want that or you still thrive in it. Just in the last letter, when you were explaining that the vague, "It is what it is" comment, you said things like, "Too much history and potential, too different and too alike, elation and torment, if there were different circumstances…"

It sounds like you think the past is holding you up; I don't know what you are thinking. Are you chasing a grail? I don't mean me, I really don't. If I did, I'd be pretty stuck up and vain. I don't think this is all about me. When I suggest that you may very well be chasing after the grail I mean that you are chasing after the past. And I might be a little part of that past you are seeking.

I've been so stuck in ranting about my own problems to you and letting you dish out solutions that I've been blind to the undertone of your letters. I caught it in your first one, when you were saying you loved me, but I rejected you. Then we got caught up in analysis pieces of poetry and me complaining about everything. I overlooked the, I don't know how to word it, the _longing _in your letters. Don't deny it. You've written "Love, Jess" at the end of almost all of your letters. I can't excuse it as an off hand thing, because you're not the type of person who would write "love" at the closing of their letter lightly or for all your letters. Some quirky people do. You're not one of them. I haven't even written love due to the implications that simple courtesy phrase could have.

"There's this elusive chance that we could have made it, if things had been different. The circumstances…us…I don't know. I really don't know." You wrote that, in your last letter. Okay, this is more… curious and disrupting than, "It is what it is. You. Me." A little more fleshed out, a little less mysterious, but still a discovery of what is between us. The "what if's" or the "could have been's", that are not too grand when you get tied up in them. The idea, "if I had only done _this_ differently or if I could change _that_." They're no good I've been there before. Going over and over the mistakes I made. Dwelling in them, looking back, instead of looking forward and trying to figure out how to repair my life in the future, not agonizing on what I could have done different in the past.

You are accomplished, Jess. You have an awesome job, a cool place to live and good friends. You have healed relationships with Luke and your mother and maybe even your father, for all I know. At the least, you got to know him. You've written a brilliant novel. You are talented and successful. Don't let things like the past hold you back or slow you down. Don't chase after the grail, it's not all what Indiana Jones and Monty Python crack it up to be.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm seeing things that aren't there, but I wasn't wrong the first time. I need to tell you, you can't relive the past.

I'm not sure I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I did.

-Rory


	12. Jess's Response The Great Gatsby 2

* * *

**Aki-** Yes, the next chapter. Kudos to my beta, kaypgirl, for fixing typos and pointing out where stuff didn't make no sense...

* * *

Rory,

Maybe I'm a little caught up in the past. But the past is important to me. It _is_ important. It is part of who I am. I learned a lot of things from the past. It has made me the person I am today. I had a lot of good times in the past, times I wish I could go back to sometimes. You said you can't relive the past, well Gatsby felt different: "_You can't repeat the past? Why of course you can!_"

I say that, and well, that idea got Gatsby in a lot of trouble. Because you can't repeat the past. It's just one of those things that are impossible. But that doesn't stop humans like me from wanting to. It's stupid, I know, and impractical. As much as things are going well for me today, I still want some parts of my life that have been left in the past. I'm not over you.

I wish I could relive the past. I really, really wish it. I wish I could bring back what I had with you when we were dating or even when we were just friends flirting like mad and talking about books and all the crazy people in Stars Hollow. As much as we try now and as many letters as we have written to each other, it's not the same. There is so much pretense, almost, I guess. I don't know what I'm trying to say. So much…dancing around what we really mean. Both of us apologizing profusely to each other and telling the other not to blame themselves. It's almost like every letter is trying to make the other person be comfortable. I should just come out and be straight with what I think and what I want.

I love you and I am not over you. I alternate between wishing you could just be an insignificant speck in the past that I hate and wanting to get it all back. But I can't do either. I'm stuck and I hate that, but I also thrive in it. I don't know what to do about it. Get over you or keep going after you. I haven't decided yet, so I'm in the middle, unable to do either.

And that's what I meant when I said, "It is what it is." It's what I meant when I tried to explain what "It is what it is" meant. Look how well we're getting along through this correspondence, how deep we are getting, and how possible romantic feelings could be mutual between us; it happened in the past. We have potential. You and me could be an "us". But that's dashed, those hopes, because of our history. We're still hashing through it. We're still asking forgiveness and dishing it out.

The second issue is we are both alike and different. Look at us. Raised by single mothers. Book-lovers to the extreme, since we were kids. I can keep up with your fast-wit references. Who else can do that besides your mother? We are on the same wavelength, on music and movies and all kinds of other stuff. And even stuff that we don't agree on; we have a good time bickering over Hemmingway and Indian food and _Almost Famous_. At the same time, we are from two different worlds. You're happy Mom and good relationship, I'm screwed up family. You're the valedictorian and the Ivy League and I'm the high school flunk out. You're small town and I'm big city. You're rich grandparents and I'm low class.

As much as I enjoy getting these letters from you…as much as I can't wait for your responses to my words…as much as I can't believe we're on talking terms again…it hurts. It hurts more than just a pang or as a vague unease. It hurts totally and completely, every inch through. But I keep writing and I keep reading. It's like when you have a mouth sore that you keep tonguing or a scab you keep picking. The pain is familiar and slightly comforting, but you don't mind its absence when it's finally gone, but while its there, you want to feel it to know its there, to test how bad it is.

To put it straight, this correspondence is torture. Complete, eternal damnation, torment. And I'm addicted to it. I love it, because it's a tiny piece of you I have, while the rest I miss is a painful absence. A tortuous absence. It's like as they say in Billy's _Much Ado About Nothing_, "I do suffer love indeed, for I love thee against my will."

I don't know if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I guess I did.

Love,

Jess


	13. Rory's Response The Great Gatsby 3

Dear Jess,

God, I feel like an idiot. Not just a stupid idiot, but a mean idiot too. I guess that is a jerk. Well, I feel like an idiot and a jerk then. I didn't realize… I didn't even consider what I must have been doing to you, writing you like this. I'm being a horrible tease, aren't I?

I had no idea, or maybe I did and I just didn't want to face the facts, that I was anchoring you to the past with these letters. For me, these letters have been about fixing and forgiveness and closure, but they mean something completely different to you. Yes, we have been rebuilding our relationship, whatever it is, some weird type of friendship, pen-pal deal. I don't want to be the cause of your pain. That almost sounds self-centered as I write that, that _I _don't want to feel guilty for you suffering because this correspondence is eternal damnation torment. But that's not it. I love writing to you and getting your responses and insights and everything. But if it's hurting you, I don't want to do it.

I think, except for the very few self-actualized, inside all of us will be that urge, sometimes large and sometimes small, to want to change the past or relive it or whatever. I know there are things I wish I hadn't done. It's easy to want to, and try to, regain the past, but it's not possible to actually reach it, as Nick explained about Gatsby, "_tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms further… And one fine morning— So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past._"

But we all have to move on from the past sometime, even if that lingering want is still tugging at the back of our minds. We have to stop the past from keeping us down, from holding us back, from hurting us anymore. It's hard and it can hurt and sometimes it even seems impossible. But Jess, I already know you are stronger than that. I do. I've been a witness to it. You've defied the odds and the collective expectations of Stars Hollow. You should be proud. I know that I am.

So here comes the part I really don't want to write or do, but I have to. It's better for you, maybe for both of us. I'm not going to write anymore. It's not fair to you. I'm giving you a little taste, a little teaser, of me, but I am not there for all you need. I want you to move on. I don't want you to hate me, I've said that before, but if you must, then I accept it. I don't want to be an insignificant speck in your past because I hope that I have helped you in some way, like the way that you have helped me. I hope you learned from me like I have learned from you. But if you must see me as insignificant, then do so. I hope that one day you can look back on what we had as friends and as boyfriend-girlfriend as a good time. Get past all the strife and craziness and fights and the rest of the mess, and see how great it was, for what it was. I have. I want you to be there too.

Maybe you still don't understand why I am doing this. You'll never be able to heal from the past while I'm still here. I caused that wound and now I'm keeping it open. If I remove myself from the picture, you have a chance to move on, at least better than if I continued to write and build our relationship and hopefully better than before we started writing letters. We have resolved a lot of issues between us, got a lot of words and feelings and truths out into the open without dealing with teenage, high school games that seemed to slow us down years ago. By removing myself, maybe you'll have a better chance of not hurting and being completely happy without me.

I'm arguing with myself whether or not I should send this letter. I haven't been this undecided since I wrote the first one. Some part of me thinks I shouldn't send this at all. I should cut you off cold turkey, but then you wouldn't understand, if you can ever understand this. Well, then I wouldn't have a chance to explain. This might seem abrupt but that just stays in tune with the rest of the times we've spent together. We've always ended abruptly. It's our thing, I guess. I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it… then I guess I did.

With my apologies and with my friendship and for the last time,

Rory Gilmore

* * *

**Aki-** I have one thing to say before you all freak out...This Is Not The End!!

Okay, commence freaking out.

* * *


	14. Jess's Response The Great Gatsby 3

**Aki-** I had this big rant typed up on my home computer about how this chapter contains my favorite _Great Gatsby_ quote of all time. Currently I'm at my grandmother's house, so I will summerize. This chapter contains my favorite _Great Gatsby_ quote of all time. I luv it! If you hadn't figured it out, I love the book, _The Great Gatsby,_ and I also think there are a lot of parrallels between Gatsby and Daisy and Jess and Rory. (At this point I think I said something about hating _The Great Gatsby_ movie due to Mia Farrow looking kinda scary to me and Robert Redford not being as cool as the Jay Gatsby in my mind). I also want to warn you this letter spoils a big plot point in _The Great Gatsby_, but as this novel has been out of, like, decades, I think it is okay to spoil. Anyway, I think this summary has just gotten longer than the thing I wrote at home so...

Oh yeah, this is not the end either.

* * *

Rory,

"_He must have felt that he had lost the old warm world, paid a high price for living too long with a single dream. He must have looked up at an unfamiliar sky through frightening leaves and shivered as he found what grotesque thing a rose is and how raw the sunlight was upon the scarcely created grass. A new world, material without being real, where poor ghosts, breathing dreams like air, drifted fortuitously about_."

This is how Gatsby felt right after he lost Daisy for good, and he finally comprehended it, and right before he died. It's always been one of my favorite parts of the novel; so much explanation in such finally woven words. I guess I never thought I'd understand their meaning as much I do right now.

I've always been holding onto that fine, thin thread of hope of something between you and me. A foolish, not completely realistic hope, but still a hope. I realize now that you and I could only have had, at the best, a slightly strained friendship. Whether the strain was from us or from others who could not understand how ex-boyfriend and girlfriend could get along with each other without something else going on. Even if I want you or still harbor my feelings towards you, I get it, it's gone, it's done, it's over. I told you before, how when you live too long with a single ideal, a single goal, a single dream, that too often the expectations of its greatness become greater than obtaining that dream could possibly be. However, living too long in a single dream with a single goal has another affect as well. See, once that dream is destroyed, once that goal proves impossible to attain, once the idolized is beyond grasp for good…then the world around you changes.

I don't know any fancy words that could be better than the ones Fitzgerald gives Gatsby's feelings. Losing a warm world, one you knew and were comfortable with. It's like taking off the rose-colored glasses you didn't even know you had on, especially when, like me, you are not a particularly optimistic person and you're surprised that the world gets duller and colder and crueler. Everything is just different and not as beautiful as it was before and you can't do anything about it, because it was caused by the loss of a bigger ideal.

I'm not saying it's your fault; I'm just saying that's how it is. You're gone now, for good. I guess I will deal with it. I have to. I understand, or at least I am trying to, your reasoning for not continuing to write me. I see that you aren't stopping because it's what's best for you, but because it's what you think is what's best for me. I can't say your wrong, but I can't exactly say that you are right either.

I wasn't going to write this. I really, really wasn't. I figured, what else is there to say since you decided to cut me off. But I figured I should at least respond so you would know what's going on with me. I'm not going to chew you out or make a big fuss. That's not very mature, is it? And mature is supposed to be my new thing now. It's crap, cuts half the fun out of life. Anyway, neither am I going to beg you to write me again nor to contact me nor give you some sort of guilt trip. If you're done, then I'm done after this. Thanks Rory, for everything. I still meant what I said, I could have never have done this without you. And I know you know that I mean more than just _The Subsect._

I guess I'll try to move on. I don't hate you Rory and you won't become an insignificant speck in my past. I have learned a lot from you that will always be a part of me. I'll try to move on. I feel like a sap, saying that so many times. I guess it's hard to move on from your first and only real love. But, people do it everyday, not everyone marries their high school sweetheart. Not everyone grows old with the first person they said "I love you" to. Not everyone's love story ends that way. It's crap, but it's life. I'll deal. I've dealt with worse.

Thank you for everything. I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I guess I did.

With my friendship and love and for the last time,

Jess Mariano

* * *

Kudos to my beta, Kaypgirl, esp. on her speedy return of the chapter.


	15. An Interlude with Prufrock

**Aki**- Sorry for the wait, but this chapter is longer than the normal one to make up for. Neither is it a letter, for once. But it will go back to letter format next chapter. The poem in here is excerpts from "The Love Song by J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot. Thanx to kaypgirl for betaing.

**An Interlude with "Prufrock" **

_Let us go then, you and I,  
When the evening is spread out against the sky  
_

They waited as the days, and then the weeks, rolled by. Two days turned into seven and one week into three. He expected her to write. She expected him to call. He expected her to show up. She expected another novel, a post-card, a fruit basket, a smoke signal…anything! Neither of them could take goodbye seriously, but neither of them was ready to move on.

_And indeed there will be time  
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,  
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;  
There will be time, there will be time  
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;  
There will be time to murder and create,  
And time for all the works and days of hands  
That lift and drop a question on your plate;  
Time for you and time for me.  
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,  
And for a hundred visions and revisions,  
Before the taking of a toast and tea._

He had once asked her to run away with him. It was a crazy, desperate plea, a last attempt at a broken relationship. She said "no." In hindsight, he should have expected it. The odds had been greatly against him. They weren't dating, he had proved unreliable in the past, he had nothing to offer her, she couldn't trust him, he had broken her heart, he had a tendency to run away, plus the fact that her life was a million times better than his had been at the time. Still, when he had shouted those words, he had believed she would say "yes". Why? He had been great at convincing her to do stuff in the past. Little things she didn't even realize she was giving into: the Basket Auction lunch date, the horse-carriage ride tagalong, the fateful trip for ice cream during the tutoring session. Somewhere along the line he had lost his pull on Rory. He couldn't believe he failed and…he waited everyday, opening the mail box anticipating the next letter he never received.

He had thought he had "moved on" until every time Rory came back into his life. He guessed he should have figured it out by the sparse amount of dates he had been on since and the nonexistent amount of second dates. But Rory was out now, out of his life for good, except, crap, if Luke and Lorelai ever got married, they were engaged, again. But romantically, Rory Gilmore was out of the picture, hopefully or, perhaps, not hopefully. But he was ready, kind of. Yeah, sure, ready. He was ready for a new girl, a new life, a new love. He was ready to be his own man, not using anybody as a crutch. He could be happy without her. He had complete faith in that statement. It was just maybe he didn't want to be.

Jess stared at the few words written in a notebook page. He tore it out, crumpled it up, and threw it in the wastebasket. He had said he wasn't going to beg and that was one word he was going to stand by. He began writing new words; words that Matt and Chris had been begging him for, for years. He hadn't wanted to write anything since _The Subsect._ And he hadn't wanted to write that either. It just happened. After it was published he wanted to take it all back. It was embarrassing…personal. No, it wasn't the retelling of his life or even part of it. It was more than that. It was a piece of his soul ripped out and transcribed into words. His hopes and dreams; his doubts and failures; bittersweet memories and broken promises. Everything he wanted to be and everything he wasn't. It was life at his best and worst and the truth as he saw it. And he hated the fact that it was out there for the world to see. He wanted a recall. He wanted to tear out the pages and burn them. He wanted to revise everything but the back cover. He wanted to explain, so people would know, so they could understand what he meant, so they didn't get it wrong.

_The Subsect_ had been a book about someone who was lost and then was found. This would be about someone who was found and then was lost.

_And indeed there will be time  
To wonder, Do I dare?'' and, Do I dare?''  
Time to turn back and descend the stair,  
Do I dare  
Disturb the universe?  
In a minute there is time  
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse. _

Rory wrote four different letters, all of which she reread once and then threw away in restaurant bathrooms or, for one, burned over a stove. She had started countless others. If it was up to her she would have written and mailed them. But she wasn't abstaining for herself, she was abstaining for him.

And it wasn't as if she could just start writing him again if she just felt the urge. Not after that lengthy, well-reasoned, "I'm not going to write you anymore" letter. It had to be something profound and she had nothing profound to say. Technically, she hadn't talked to Jess or seen him in over a year. There only communications had been through those letters and…she had found comfort in them. She didn't have a home she went back to every night while she was on the road following Obama's campaign trail. Her mother called her almost everyday, spouting off Star Hollow nonsense and news, often at random and even inconvenient times, like during press conferences or speeches. Emily made her sporadic check ups. Paris and Lane kept in contact via email. She told none of them about her correspondence with Jess. There was never an opening and it didn't seem necessary. But, God, how she now missed those letters. There was something reassuring about getting a letter and writing a letter every week or week-and-a-half. A little bit of routine in her currently unorganized life.

Now it was gone.

She missed the letters. She missed Jess. But she couldn't explain why. She couldn't tell anyone. And she couldn't tell Jess. She wouldn't dare.

_And would it have been worth it, after all,  
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,  
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,  
Would it have been worth while,  
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,  
To have squeezed the universe into a ball  
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,  
To say: I am Lazarus, come from the dead,  
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all''--  
If one, settling a pillow by her head,  
Should say: That is not what I meant at all.  
That is not it, at all.'' _

It was worth it. It was worth the pain and the tangle ups and the absolute crazy obsession. After everything, it was worth it. Rory was worth it.

And it wasn't just Rory; it was everything that came with her. It was a package deal. Dealing with Lorelai, and Emily, and Luke getting pissed and overprotective, and gossiping Babette and Miss Patty, and raving Taylor, and crazy Kirk, and a rather stupid and uncannily tall Dean, and an asshole Logan. He knew there was a whole town in Connecticut that he had become an enemy to and he had absolutely no chance of remedying that.

And perhaps there had been some good things in that package deal other than just being with the girl he never got over. He learned a lot, about her, himself, the world. He knew it sounded cliché, but it was true. No one else was ready to give him a chance. Well, maybe Luke had, but Luke hadn't always been the most congenial person and Jess used to scorn his uncle for his attempts to help. Jess knew it was because he had believed the only reason that Luke was there was because it was an obligation. Jess should have learned that family wasn't an obligation for some people, like his father, and his mother before she straightened herself out. Jess had straightened himself out to. He went off, away from Luke and Liz and Jimmy and even Rory. All of them had affected his change, had played into it, but he had done it by himself. But running off to find yourself is not as romantic as it seems. Running away had hurt almost everyone in the world that gave a damn about him. He's tried to fix that.

But most people still didn't understand him and that was okay. Not even with words or books or arguments would they ever understand. That's why he was so antsy about publishing _The Subsect_ and why he was so unsure of handing over those few hard-worked beginning pages of his new work to Matt and Chris. He knew people would argue over interpretations and misinterpretations, about who the characters where, and what the themes meant. Jess was getting really caught up in the fact that people were going to take his words and use them for what he didn't intend and in ways he could never understand, but at the same time he was amazed by the chance his words had of surviving the decades. Too many people's words are forgotten…

_And would it have been worth it, after all,  
Would it have been worth while,  
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,  
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor--  
And this, and so much more?--  
It is impossible to say just what I mean!  
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:  
Would it have been worth while  
If one, settling a pillow, or throwing off a shawl,  
And turning toward the window, should say:  
That is not it at all,  
That is not what I meant, at all.'' _

It was worth it. It was worth the hurt and the confusion and all the terrible teenage fights. After everything, it was worth it. Jess was worth it.

Rory banged the backspace button agitatedly on her laptop. She couldn't write. Well, technically, she could still write. She could still form compilations of symbols called letters that stand for sound into words and those words, which all stand for different objects, idea, actions, and whatnot, into sentences and phrases that mean knowledgeable things…but she couldn't "_write_ write" or, perhaps, "write _right_". Her words were just not coming out correctly or at least not in the way she intended. It was increasingly frustrating, especially because she had promised an article to her editor by the end of the day.

She had been having this "writing difficulty" since…oh, no, it was just a coincidence it had started days after she cut herself off from Jess. Pure coincidence, yeah…exactly.

She kept thinking of things she wanted to tell Jess or read something and made a mental note to reference it in her next letter before she remembered there wasn't going to be one. She had so many things to say and no one to say them to and it made her antsy and forgetful and irritated and a million other little annoying things. The biggest problem was that she didn't have anyone to vent her problems to anyway. She hadn't made any close friends in the reporting field as she was traveling. Some acquaintances and casual friends she might share light-hearted conversations with, but none she could explain and dump this on. Her other friends weren't around and even if they were, she was not sure that they would get it. Paris was never the most, let's say, sympathetic when dealing with other people's relationship troubles. Lane might have been a good option, but Rory felt bad at the idea of laying her trivial problems when Lane was dealing with motherhood and her husband touring with another band. And Mom, well as much as Rory trusted her mother, Mom never quite got how things were with her and Jess.

She didn't know what to do. Rory closed her laptop and set aside her work for latter. She opened a file folder in her satchel like purse and pulled out a pile of old letters.

_No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;  
Am an attendant lord, one that will do  
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,  
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,  
Deferential, glad to be of use,  
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;  
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;  
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous--  
Almost, at times, the Fool. _

"This is good… really good," said Chris, clipping through the pages.

"Brilliant," added Matt. Jess flinched and made a face at the compliments but, well, he flinched at any response to his writings.

"Yeah, well, you said _The Subsect _was brilliant…"

"It _was_ brilliant." Again Jess made a face. "Where's the rest?"

"The…rest?" repeated Jess.

"Of the story."

"Well, there isn't a 'rest' yet."

"You mean this is it."

"…"

"Jeez, Mariano, you're killing me!"

…

"Gilmore…hey, Gilmore…" Rory groaned as she was pocked in the side. She opened her eyes narrowly to glare at her bus seat companion, a snarky, late twenties woman who had come to be on familiar terms with Rory.

"What?" said Rory without apology, she was sleeping, dammit.

"You're phone's ringing." Rory paused and listening, indeed it was ringing in her purse.

"Normally I wouldn't have said anything," said the woman as Rory dug through her bag, "But the person is obviously not happy with voicemail because they keep calling back every five minutes. It's getting quite annoying."

Rory dug with more fever for her phone. If someone was calling insistently like that it was either an emergency or a report of really good news. She would have thought it was her mother, who had the spirit to incessantly call, except that it was her generic ring tone playing and not her song, the song that her mother specifically chose and programmed. Rory was secretly thankful that it wasn't her mother's ring tone just because having "I Like Big Butts" playing every five minutes would have been very embarrassing. Knowing that it was not her mother added a ray of hope for Rory that, perhaps, it was someone else, someone she hadn't talked to in a while, but really wanted to.

Her hand wrapped around her phone and in not enough time, as it was ready with one more ring to cut off and go to voicemail. She didn't have time to check the number and she clicked the talk button.

"Hello?" she said breathlessly, hoping beyond hope it was who she expected.

"I was beginning to think you were avoiding me, Ace."

It wasn't who she expected.

_I grow old__ . . . I grow old . . .  
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.  
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. _

_I do not think that they will sing to me. _


	16. Rory's Letter Gatsby Returns

Hey, all. Tenshi here. Aki's on vacation for the week, so I'm here to post the chapter! Um. I'm not sure how she usually does this, so I'll just say "thank you" to Aki's beta, and I hope you don't mind that I made some changes, too. Um. So, yeah. On with the story.

* * *

Dear Jess,

God, I know I said I wasn't going to write you anymore. And I wasn't. I really wasn't. I tried and tried to resist the temptation. I should have because now I am not only being a hypocrite; I am opening a whole big can of worms.

As I write this I am reminded of when I wrote my first letter to you all those months ago. I desperately needed help, needed someone to talk to, to confide in. And as everything turns out, I needed _you_ because you're the one who was there when all my insecurities about life and love and…I just need to talk to you again. See, something happened, something I've been waiting for and now that it has happened, I realize it's not what I want. And that something goes by the name of Logan. Yes, he somehow popped into my life again. He called me, after a whole year. He talked, started saying all these things I would have loved to hear a few months ago. How he was sorry he broke it off with me just because I didn't want to get engaged yet, how he respected and admired my career, and how he still loved me and didn't want anyone else. That was what I wanted when I wrote my first letter to you in confusion and desperation. I wanted Logan back. And when he said those things just two days ago, I was happy, I liked to be loved and cared for by him and fancied the idea that we could still be together…until everything else got in the way.

I need to pull out another phrase from _The Great Gatsby_ on this one, a line from Daisy, explaining why she is happy that her only child is a daughter, "_All right…I'm glad it's a girl. And I'll hope she'll be a fool—that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool_." I was happy, for a split second, and then it all went away. Because I am not a fool, at least not in the way Daisy is referring. No, I am too knowledgeable about things, life and human nature and a whole mix of emotions inside me. Sometimes I wish I was a foolish girl, because then I could live in a fairy tale world and pretend - no, _believe_ that everything will work out for the best.

See, I need to tell you something; something important, that I should have realized a long time ago. I know that I can't be happy with Logan, not anymore. I was, once. And maybe if certain incidents hadn't happened between us, we could have had a happy future. But not now; perhaps because now I don't even want one with him. Months ago I wanted something from Logan – closure, or an explanation as to how what we had could have ended so fast, and why his love stopped when I made my decision to travel instead of settling down. Our love hadn't been over at that moment, because we were both taking so long to get over the other as proof of his recent phone call and my obsessing. But I am ready to move on now, away from him. He will be another part of the person I am today.

But see, there is still something that I need to tell you, something that I have been avoiding since the start of this letter. Before I got caught up in talking to Logan and wondering what we almost were, I was not expecting him to call. In fact, when I rushed to dig through my bag to find my phone (which had been ringing nonstop, according to my bus-seat buddy), I was expecting someone else entirely. I thought it was going to be you on the phone. I really wanted it to be you. This little letter hiatus we were on, it was killing me. I hadn't realized how dependent on your letters I had become until I knew that no more were coming.

This is foolish, writing this letter after I tried to stop this whole letter-writing thing. I must be addicted or maybe I didn't consider how important these letters are to me. I have no illusions of how you will respond to this - if you respond at all. It's just, I miss you already. Even though I have not actually seen you in a long time, I still miss the piece of you that comes through in these letters.

I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I guess I did.

Sincerely,

Rory

* * *

Hope you enjoyed!


	17. Jess's Response Gatsby Returns

Aki- thanks to Tenshi who proofed this for me. I think I am going to try to finish this fic before I go away to college for my Freshmen year.

* * *

Dear Rory,

I'm glad you wrote. I really am, because I really missed not hearing from you. I guess 'hearing' isn't the most correct term in this case. I missed not receiving your letters, would be more correct, albeit, a lot more wordy. But all of that is beside the point. I missed you. I'm glad you're back. I'm glad we're back.

Here's another _Gatsby_ quote for you:

_It is invariably saddening to look through new eyes at things upon which you have expended your own powers __of__adjustment. _

I think this is somewhat what happened with you and Logan, at least perhaps your view of Logan. Sometimes one makes things or people greater then they actually are. Not always necessarily greater, but one will tweak them in one's thoughts and memories (and often not consciously or intentionally) into a different person than they actually are. They end up representing something, like one's happy ending (or whatever), even though it is not right to lay all the responsibility of one's happiness onto their shoulders. Logan had been the person you'd _made _him to be in his absence. You'd built him up to be the person that you could live with in a fairy tale ending…I know what I'm talking about. I've been there.

But the thing is, there are no fairy tale endings; life's a bit tougher than that and it sucks, I know. And there's no use complaining about it. But what happens when you get back that something that you want? See, I can only guess from here on. I never got back what I wanted so much. I've had a few brushes with it and become close, but only as close as friends, which is not nearly as close as I want. I've had to face life and reality and realize that the person I uplifted was not real, but the amazing person behind the exaggeration _was_. But I never got what I wanted. So I can theorize what it was like for you, who had built up this blonde- jerk into something you admired and wanted back beyond reason. When you heard his voice again and he apologized and swore he loved you and wanted to be with again after well over a year of absence….I can only imagine first you felt a swirl of pure joy and exaltation that started deep in your gut and slowly filled you to the brim. However, it didn't last, it quickly dispersed as if from a popped balloon when the realization hit you…that this was not what you wanted, not this time, maybe even never, because you had changed and he wasn't exactly what you had made him to be, and all the same problems and issues were still there.

You lost something you didn't even have and that didn't even exist. But it still hurt. However, when you lose that something you thought you wanted…perhaps something else you didn't realize you wanted will come to the forefront of your life.

So what you have to ask yourself now is what you want. It's okay if you can't figure it out all at once, or if takes you a while, but you have to look for what you want. Otherwise you'll be just wandering aimlessly. We both know what you want for a career, and you are pursuing that. What you have to look at now is what you want for your personal life. I know what it is like to drift through life with no goals, no outlooks, no dreams, no anything…And you don't get anywhere fast like that. You have half of your life figured out and you are successfully following that, but don't forget the other half, because then your life will just drag.

I think this next phrase I'm saying more out of obligation than out of truth, but here it goes anyway: I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get this, then I guess I did.

Love,

Jess


	18. Rory's Response Gatsby Returns

Dear Jess,

Oh man, I know what I want!, in both parts of my life. In my personal life I want to be in a good relationship with my mother, my friends, my family, and my town. And I'm handling all of those fairly well considering I'm on a bus, criss-crossing the country. There's also one more thing that I want in my personal life: a person I want a relationship with, in a more romantic sense. I don't mean that I need the roses and poems and kisses…I need something more. I need a person I can rely on, hold on to, trust, believe in - and I need that person to be able to do the same to me. If you don't mind me referring back to _The Great Gatsby_ once again (gosh, I have reread this novel so many times recently):

_He smiled understandingly--much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced—or seemed to face—the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey._

A lot of people spend many years of their lives trying to find this 'someone'. I mean, it took Mom a long time to find Luke. It took them both a long time to find each other, or at least realize that each was standing right before the other's eyes. There is someone standing right in front of my eyes. It's you, Jess. It's you. I don't know how I was so blind to it before. I don't. But I presume it was the type of blindness you're blind to yourself.

I've been blinded by distance - a stupid reason when you truly care about someone; we've built a whole friendship on distance. I've been blinded by our history, despite all the apologies and forgiveness and explanations we have been exchanging. I've been blinded by Logan. Not by _him_, intentionally, but I've been holding tight onto the last threads of my relationship with him and only recently when he called me did I see fit to finally let those threads go. But you've been right there the whole time and you told me you loved me in, like, your second letter to me. And I said I didn't feel the same way, and we continued to write and be friends . . . and I'm lost without your letters.

You understand. You understood in the last letter. You've understood in all of them. And you will understand this time too. More than that, you believe in me - more, sometimes, than I believe in myself. A belief that has saved me and sustained me through seasons of doubt and weakness and failures. You see the best in me, even at my worst, or maybe you see the best I can be despite whatever the current circumstances are. You are one of those people who I know has always believed I could be anything I set my mind to be, just as I believed you could be much better than where you were heading.

So I ask, knowing that you are there, will you continue to be there? Be here, with me, even miles and states apart. Because I am. I could never give up these letters now, knowing what I know. And knowing that you are the one person that fits me, if that makes any sense. Like puzzle pieces on those really tough puzzles, with, like, 3000 pieces or something ridiculous. There are some pieces that look like they go together or belong near each other in the picture. There are some pieces that almost fit and are jammed together, but don't actually fit. You fit.

I agree with you what you wrote just before our traditional closing statement last letter - that it is being written out of obligation, rather than an honest portrayal of the circumstances…I'm not sure if I'm going to send this, but if you get it, then I guess I did.

Love,

Rory


	19. Jess's Response Psalm of Life

Aki- Ah, my first update from college! Woot, woot! Anyway, I'm attendin Susquehanna University and majoring in Creative Writing (go figure). Um, this isn;t that long, it just looks that way because of the poem which are a few stanza's oof Longfellow's Psalm of Life.

* * *

Dear Rory,

I can't explain how long I've been waiting to hear what you said last letter. Longer than just since we've been corresponding, longer then when you gave me a kiss in Philly, longer then when I asked you to run away with me, longer then when I told you I loved you, longer then when you said you might have loved me over the phone, longer then our first kiss… It's been a really long time, even if I didn't realize what exactly I had wanted at the time. However, hearing you say you want me, you love me, is not exactly what I expected. Hasn't that almost been a theme of our letters? The something that you want doesn't live up to its expectation once you get it?

Do not get me wrong, I am not saying that I am upset or not happy about your proclamation last letter. It's just, not as much as I expected it would be. I guess it doesn't feel the same when it is in ink on cold, lifeless paper, rather than in person. You love me now, so what? No, not 'so what,' but what now? Your miles and miles away from where I am and loving each other only feels good in words and but not in any other way. So what, we love each other, but that automatically doesn't mean everything is suddenly a picture perfect world. Technically we are not even in the semblance of a relationship and that's I want. But we can't, because like I said before, we are miles and miles apart and have only used pen and pencil to communicate with flowery words. I want more…I need more and I'm not sure what to do about waiting while you travel the country.

_Tell me not in mournful numbers,  
"Life is but an empty dream!"  
For the soul is dead that slumbers,  
And things are not what they seem._

Life is real! Life is earnest!  
And the grave is not its goal;  
"Dust thou art, to dust returnest,"  
Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,  
Is our destined end or way;  
But to act, that each to-morrow  
Find us further than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,  
And our hearts, though stout and brave,  
Still, like muffled drums, are beating  
Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,  
In the bivouac of Life,  
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!  
Be a hero in the strife!

_Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!  
Let the dead Past bury its dead!  
Act -- act in the living Present!  
Heart within, and God o'erhead!  
_

I'm done living in the past. I've been done with the past for a long time. I look forward to the future, but I do not dwell in it. I live a day at a time, not sure what tomorrow will bring. The future is never sure, never secure. I am living for the present, are you gonna be in that with me?

I wasn't sure if I was going to send this, but if you get this, then I guess I did.

Love,

Jess


	20. Rory's Response Pslam of Life

**Aki- **Wow, here is a very delayed chapter. I used to get annoyed when facfic authors said they couldn't write because they were away at college. Well, I've had time between classes and homework and clubs, but I was either spending it being social (something I didn't do all summer long as I was an antisocial loser) and when I've been writing creatively it has either been for my Intro to Fiction class or something that wasn't fanfiction. However, I will finsih this story eventually, as I am pretty sure the next chapter will be the last.

* * *

Dear Jess,

"Psalm of Life"…coming back to Longfellow are we? He writes some great stuff.Life is more than the past; life is more than walking towards the grave. Life is life. Life is real. Life is something more, it can be great. We can make our lives between than is expected if we just follow the guidelines set out before us. I feel the need to finish the poem:

_Lives of great men all remind us  
We can make our lives sublime,  
And, departing, leave behind us  
Footprints on the sands of time;_

Footprints, that perhaps another,  
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,  
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,  
Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,  
With a heart for any fate;  
Still achieving, still pursuing,  
Learn to labour and to wait,

We can leave something behind in this life. Footsteps in the sand so that when shipwrecked souls find them, they can take hope. I want to leave something behind in my life. You have your novel and I have my journalism. But even more…I want to leave something behind with you. I want to be something with you, something that is remembered and passed down. I know that sounds so 'romantic movie of the summer' to think that we could be that romance that everyone remembers. I know that is near impossible with all the millions of different people living and falling in love and defying the odds. But I want to do that too.

Yes, Yes, I want to live in the present with you. Look, the election in over in November and I'll find something more steady, more, in-on-place, so that I can be with you. Will that work? Oh, God I hope it does. I can find a job in Philly, just somewhere to start.

I am ready. I am ready to face any fate as long as you are by my side. I am ready for failing and falling and flying. I will chase my dreams and you will chase yours, but we will do it together, helping each other, loving each other. That is all I want. That is all I really wanted from the beginning, since I sent you the first letter tearing my heart out and telling you how much Logan's leaving hurt me. But I didn't say how much it hurt when you left, because it did. But now you are back. And I am back. And we want this. It is real and that is all I really wanted.

Longfellow has got some stuff down with his "Psalm of Life." He knows a little bit what he is talking about. I, for one, am all for following his advice.

I sent this with my full intention of you receiving it and reading it. No regrets. Not anymore.

I love you,

Rory


	21. The Last Letter

Aki- Ah, the last chapter. I guess it took a while considering how I swiftly I chucked out these chapters back in the beginning. Anyway, this is it. I have to finish my other two open fanfics and then I will be done with fanfiction for a while because being at college inspires me to write (I am studying creative writing), but it does not inspire me to write fanfiction. If inspiration ever strikes, I will come back, because you can't deny inspiration, but this is it for now. I hope you like it. Out.

* * *

Dear Mom,

I know that whole Jess-Me thing was a big surprise for you. Trust me, it was a surprise for me too. Anyway, you may be wondering why I am writing this rather than just calling you on the phone or driving to Stars Hollow for a visit. Well, this is how Jess and I got back together and I figured this is the best way to explain what is going on. There is something different about letters. True, they are slower, but they give more time to think. You are only going to saw what you really want and what you really need to say. There is something great about that.

So, yeah, welcome to Rory and Jess: Redemption (1). It's been happening over months; we've been in communication. And it happened slowly. I contacted him and was still hung up over Logan when it all started. I am glad it started. I like where it ended up.

Now please know that I am happy with this. I want you to give Jess a second chance or maybe a third or fourth depending on which chance he is one in your books at this point. Just give him another. You have not seen him in a long time and he has grown up. I know, I know, it is hard to believe that _Jess Mariano_ could grow up, but he has. He's not perfect, but neither am I. I think it works better that way. We have both hurt each other and been let down by the other at sometime, but we have worked through that. We don't have unrealistic expectations of each other and at the same time we want the other to be the best they can be.

I'm so happy, Mom. So happy. It's just the beginning though and I know it will get harder and I know it will hurt because I know love isn't just happily ever after and smooth sailing. If it is…I don't think it is real. Allow me to quote Florida Scott-Maxwell:

"_I wonder why love is so often equated with joy when it is everything as well. Devastation, balm, obsession, granting, and receiving excessive value, and losing it again. It is not recognition, often of what you are not but might be. It sears and it heals. It is beyond pity and above law. It can seem like the truth."_

This is what love is to me. I know I am still young, but I have lived enough, I think, and I have loved enough. I have given my love to three different men in my life and I had three distinct relationships. Each had both good and bad things. All three ended. I saw how they fell apart. I lived it. I lived the pain. By all means I should give up. There is a lot of suffering involved in love, in willing to risk yourself in someone else's hands, in putting yourself at your most vulnerable. I know you are probably still skeptical about Jess. I know a whole lot of people will think this is a stupid decision. I am willing to risk it. I am ready and willing and everyone whoever put their heart in the hands of the person they loved has made this same decision. Sometimes it blows up in your face. I know it. But for all that you risk, you have that much to gain. _  
_So Mom, I want you to know that I am in love. I love Jess and he loves me and we are in love with each other and that does not conquer all and I will not even pretend to live under that conclusion. I can say now that, but there will times that I will not. I can say that this feels right and I know there will be times when I will cry and be angry and everything will seem so not right. I feel like I am learning so much, but I'll be stupid too. I am ready for everything that life and love has in store for me. I am ready to face it all.

So, yeah, Jess and I are a couple. We've been seeing each other ever since I got a job in Philly, a surge of luck on my part. I still get to travel, but I actually have a place to live between all the traveling except hotel rooms.

You're my mom. I both know and expect you to always be worried about me, to be over protective and be critical of an guy I'm in a relationship with, especially if you are afraid he will hurt me, especially especially because he has a track record. But between all of that, be happy for me Mom.

Love,

Rory

…

"What are you doing?"

Rory turned in her chair to see her boyfriend standing behind her. "Writing a letter to Mom."

"Didn't you talk to her on the phone an hour ago?" Jess asked, an eyebrow rose in questioning.

"Yeah, but," Rory smiled and shrugged, "There are some things that you just need to write out in a letter to explain…you may be familiar with the concept."

"Huh."

"Ever the articulate one, are we?"

"Yup."

…

P.S. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

…

(1) This is a reference to the episode after the 24 hour danceathon when Rory and Jess are finally a couple and Lorelai refers to them as Rory and Jess: The Early Years. I figured they have had the "Break Up" years and are still too young for the "Later Years", so yeah, "Redemption."


End file.
